Dana Suesse, the “Girl Gershwin”

The following biography of Dana Seusse is for the Bull City Saxophone Quartet’s performance at the 2025 Navy Saxophone Symposium. If you will not be at the saxophone symposium and would like to learn more about this influential American composer, please read on.

Dana Suesse (1909-1987) was an American composer and pianist who was one of a small handful of women working in Tin Pan Alley. She penned a number of popular songs including “You Aught to be in Pictures,” “The Night is Young and You’re so Beautiful,” and “My Silent Love.”

Suesse was born in Kansas City in 1909. As a piano prodigy, she gave her first recital in Drexel Hall in 1919. After graduating from high school in 1926, she moved to New York City to pursue a career as a concert pianist, studying with Alexander Siloti and Rubin Goldmark. Suesse soon learned that even though she had the skills to be concert pianist, there wasn’t any money to be made in classical music. Determined to make a living, she switched gears from writing classical music to jazz music. As a young women, she had problems getting publishers to take her work seriously. She teamed up with RCA music producer Nat Shilkret, who lent his name on one of her first copyrighted piano works, “Syncopated Love Song” in 1928. This was the first of many hit songs in her catalogue.

At this time, Suesse becomes billed as the “Girl Gershwin.” Quoting from a press release from 1928, Suesse is “‘Known variously as ‘the girl Gershwin’ and ‘Broadway’s youngest composer,’ Miss Dana Suesse, 16 year-old prodigy from Louisiana, finds her name written in capital letters in Tin Pan Alley. Her most recent composition ‘Syncopated Love Song’ has been broadcasted by the Manhattan stations and is being recorded. She is now engaged on a New York Symphony.” As common for women in show business, the press shaved a few years off her age and invented a backstory, growing up in Louisiana rather than Kansas City. This fixation on youth and talent helps her immensely as her career grows.

The tenor saxophonist Merle Johnston and his saxophone quartet premiered “Syncopated Love Song” on NBC radio on October 26, 1928. This was the first time Suesse’s music was played for a national audience. The success of “Syncopated Love Song” meant she no longer needed the help of Shilkret to publish works under her name. Once she learned she could take the melodies in her piano music and have a lyricist add words to the melody, her songs would be easier to sell. “Syncopated Love Song” soon turned into “Have You Forgotten” and it was recorded by several bands in 1931, here is just one of the recordings.

In 1932, Paul Whiteman was looking for new music for his 4th Experiment in Jazz concert series. Suesse was given the opportunity to audition for Whiteman. For this occasion, she composed a Concerto in Three Rhythms. This work features the piano and each movement centers around a different dance form. Whiteman was thrilled with the work and accepted the concerto. Suesse made her debut with the Paul Whiteman Orchestra on November 2, 1932.

Her concerto received much praise in the press. She continued to perform this concerto on the radio and with Whiteman around New York City, including a performance at Madison Square Garden with members of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra in September 1933. Two months later, at Whiteman’s 6th Experiment in Jazz concert, she gave her debut at the Metropolitan Opera with the New York Philharmonic with her new work, Symphonic Waltzes for Piano and Orchestra.

Her most famous work written for Whiteman came in 1934, “Blue Moonlight,” which she recorded with Whiteman in 1934. This orchestration is theatrical, sounding more like a finale for a Hollywood musical than a dance number.

It wasn’t long before one of the major Hollywood studios, which were currently poaching some of New York’s finest songwriters, contacted Suesse. Seeing how film production was like working at factory, she felt like she would not be able to write her best work. She turned it down. That did not stop her music from showing up in films. In fact, her song “You aught to be in Pictures” became the unofficial song for Hollywood. Luckily for us she, filmed a short with one of her lyricists, Eddie Heyman for Paramount.

Suesse continued to collaborate with artists and lyricists in New York City. One of her most successful collaborations was with Billy Rose, a Broadway producer who staged a number of large scale productions in Fort Worth Texas and the New York World’s Fair in 1939.

As a prodigy, Suesse never received any formal training outside of her piano lessons and always wanted to learn music theory and composition. In 1947, she went to Paris to study with Nadia Boulanger for three years, where she learned music composition, counterpoint, and orchestration. There her styled matured, becoming more neoclassical, harmonically and texturally more complex. She began writing less of the lighter fair that she became famous for. With the rise of rock and roll music, she no longer had a finger on the pulse of popular music and she finally had the financial security to dedicate writing serious music along with the occasional musical. Some of her greatest piano concertos came out this period, Concerto Romantico and Jazz Concerto in D Major for Combo and Orchestra.

In 1974, Suesse showcased her music one last time at Carnegie Hall. With the help of Frederick Fennell and the American Symphony Orchestra. Suesse orchestrated some of her piano works, including 110th St. Rhumba and featured her piano concertos, played by the composer Cy Coleman. This performance was intended to be released as a record, but Suesse did not feel it was up to her standards.

To this day, few of Suesse’s works are published. Her complete scores, songs, and recordings are archived at the Library of Congress. Her style, her use of jazz, and her collaborations with musicians and band leaders place her as one of the leading American composers of the 20th century.